Hospital offers at-risk youth a grim lesson about gun violence

As a steward of its community’s health, North Philadelphia’s Temple University Hospital knows it is uniquely positioned to address the public health crisis posed by gun violence. For more than a decade, its “Cradle to Grave” program has given at-risk youth an unflinching look at the effects that guns have in their community, in the hope it will deter them from reaching for a gun to settle personal scores and help them realize that gun violence is not the glamorous business sometimes depicted on television and rap music. Examples of other innovative hospital practices to tackle the problem are highlighted on the AHA’s “Hospitals Against Violence” web page, where you also will find tools and resources to support your vital community role in reducing violence. Make no mistake. This needs to be a top priority for every hospital across America. Because no matter how one measures it, the cost of violence in our communities is simply too high to pay.